Below, in those valleys amongst the living trees and grass, was the comradeship of unnumbered life, so that to pass out into Peace, to step beyond, to die, seemed but a brotherly act, amongst all those others; but up here, where no creature breathed, we saw the heart of the desert that stretches before each little human soul. Up here, it froze the spirit; even Peace seemed mocking--hard as a stone. Yet, to try and hide, to tuck one's head under one's own wing, was not possible in this air so crystal clear, so far above incense and the narcotics of set creeds, and the fevered breath of prayers and protestations. Even to know that between organic and inorganic matter there is no gulf fixed, was of no peculiar comfort. The jealous wind came creeping over the lifeless limestone, removing even the poor solace of its warmth; one turned from it, desperate, to look up at the sky, the blue, burning, wide, ineffable, far sky. Then slowly, without reason, that icy fear passed into a feeling, not of joy, not of peace, but as if Life and Death were exalted into what was neither life nor death, a strange and motionless vibration, in which one had been merged, and rested, utterly content, equipoised, divested of desire, endowed with life and death. But since this moment had come before its time, we got up, and, close together, marched on rather silently, in the hot sun. 1910. MY DISTANT RELATIVE Though I had not seen my distant relative for years--not, in fact, since he was obliged to give Vancouver Island up as a bad job--I knew him at once, when, with head a little on one side, and tea-cup held high, as if, to confer a blessing, he said: "Hallo!" across the Club smoking-room. Thin as a lath--not one ounce heavier--tall, and very upright, with his pale forehead, and pale eyes, and pale beard, he had the air of a ghost of a man. He had always had that air. And his voice--that matter-of-fact and slightly nasal voice, with its thin, pragmatical tone--was like a wraith of optimism, issuing between pale lips. I noticed; too, that his town habiliments still had their unspeakable pale neatness, as if, poor things, they were trying to stare the daylight out of countenance. He brought his tea across to my bay window, with that wistful sociability of his, as of a man who cannot always find a listener. "But what are you doing in town?" I said. "I thought you were in Yorkshire with your aunt." Over his round, light eyes, fixed on something in the street, the lids fell quickly twice, as the film falls over the eyes of a parrot. "I'm after a job," he answered. "Must be on the spot just now." And it seemed to me that I had heard those words from him before. "Ah, yes," I said, "and do you think you'll get it?" But even as I spoke I felt sorry, remembering how many jobs he had been after in his time, and how soon they ended when he had got them. He answered: